


On A Winter's Day

by pocketmumbles (livelikejack)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: (kind of), 5 Times, Coffee Shops, F/M, Fluff, Hot Chocolate, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-06
Updated: 2015-12-06
Packaged: 2018-05-05 04:29:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5361416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livelikejack/pseuds/pocketmumbles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ken and Noshiko and hot cocoa through the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On A Winter's Day

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: _Noshiko/Ken + hot cocoa_
> 
> Sorry about tagging the relationship twice; I'm just trying to nudge "Ken Yukimura" into replacing "Mr. Yukimura" in AO3's tags.
> 
> Originally posted on [Tumblr](http://pocketlass.tumblr.com/post/134430896111/december-drabble-advent-calendar-day-2) as a series of Advent Calendar drabbles, and partially inspired by [this photoset](http://everythingyukimura.tumblr.com/post/131877440797/nicholas-sparks-the-notebook). Fic title is almost a line from ["California Dreamin'" by The Mamas And The Papas](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhZULM69DIw).
> 
> Fayerweather Hall houses Columbia’s history department, [according](http://history.columbia.edu/) [to the](http://www.wikicu.com/Fayerweather_Hall) [internet](http://www.wikicu.com/History_Department). The coffee shops are unnamed and completely fictional. I apologize greatly for any New York inaccuracies.

Ken likes working at the coffee shop. It has a homey sort of feel – as homey as a coffee shop on the corner of a bustling city street in California can get, at least. The fireplace crackling on the far wall’s TV screen is oddly comforting. It’s the little things.

The door opens with a gust of winter chill, and the woman walks in again. She’s been coming to the coffee shop every week for months. Ken never knows when to expect her – sometimes at three in the afternoon on a Tuesday, sometimes at six-thirty in the morning on a Monday. She always seems to come by during his shift, though – probably because she frequents the shop enough that at least one visit coincides with Ken’s ever-changing schedule. Still, she always smiles when she sees him at the counter, sweet and warm and her face lighting up with a secret glow, and she always remembers his name. He hasn’t learned hers yet, too shy to ask when she’s never offered it herself, but he hopes that one day…maybe.

Their tea menu isn’t very extensive, but she doesn’t seem to mind, cycling through its options month after month. Ken has learned that she favors their green tea the most, tends to order chai on days when she jokes with Ken at the counter and her favorite table by the window, and, on her happiest days when her smiles are so bright that Ken feels almost dazzled, she prefers white jasmine.

Today, she orders earl grey tea, and her smile is brittle and wan as Ken hands over her mug. He watches her retreat to her table by the window, her entire body curling around the mug as if she’s trying to soak in its heat. She doesn’t react to the door opening in front of her, doesn’t shiver from the wind or sigh in relief when the door shuts to seal in the shop’s warmth. It’s not that the chilly weather bothers her, Ken realizes, as he watches the woman stare dry-eyed into the dregs of her empty mug, but rather that she herself is…cold.

Before he loses his nerve, he steps out from behind the counter and sets a fresh mug in front of her (the white one with the cats meowing in different languages. It always makes her smile). She blinks in surprise and stares up at him with wide eyes. “On the house,” Ken says, gesturing awkwardly at the mug.

She looks down at it, and a tiny smile hints at the corner of her mouth when she sees the cats. She leans in to breathe in the drink’s steam, and her eyebrows lift. “Hot cocoa?” she asks.

“Uh, yeah.” His hands clasp awkwardly. “I know it’s not what you usually get, but, uh, it’s pretty cold out, so I thought…maybe…”

She lifts the mug delicately to take a sip. “It’s delicious,” she says, voice laced with delight. A dollop of whipped cream sticks to the tip of her nose as she lowers the mug, and Ken hastily muffles down a snort. Her entire face scrunches into a laugh as she tries to brush it away. “Oh gosh. That’s so embarrassing.”

Ken hands over a napkin with a smile. “Happens to me every time I drink something with whipped cream,” he says. “Worse, actually, gets all over my entire nose, and this one time I accidentally inhaled some.” He shakes his head. “Wasn’t my finest moment.”

“I’m kind of sad I missed that,” she says. Her smile is back, toothy and bright and crinkling her eyes into crescent moons, and she leans forward as her hands curl around the mug. “I’m Noshiko. Noshiko Yukimura.”

He beams. “My name’s Ken, but my friends call me Ken.”

She laughs.

 

* * *

 

Snow is beautiful magic. Ken has to remind himself of this time and time again, as he leaves Fayerweather Hall and ducks his head against the biting wind. Snow is beautiful magic, and it’s a treat to watch it fall every day after spending the first twenty-two years of his life in sunny, dry California. Mild winters are boring, and snow is beautiful magic.

It’s still really damn cold, though. He’s pretty sure that his face is going to crack apart any minute now.

He passes a coffee shop on the corner, the brick walls replaced with wide glass windows and cheery yellow lights glowing from deep within like a flickering fire. Another gust of windy snow blows into Ken’s face, and he quickly ducks inside.

He stops a few feet away from the counter, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darker lighting as he squints up at the menu. The tea menu stretches across two entire boards, and Ken smiles to himself. Noshiko would have liked this place, he thinks. Even if the tea wasn’t any good, she would have appreciated the variety. He plucks a business card from the counter and stows it in his wallet, making a mental note to mention the shop the next time he writes to her. Then he makes a mental note to actually write to her. His first semester of grad school has been busier than he’d expected, but – they haven’t talked in a while, and that’s his fault.

The door opens again, and the new customer hesitates behind him. “Oh, sorry,” Ken says, stepping to the side and gesturing ahead of him. “Go ahead; I’m still looking.” The woman nods a thank you and steps past him to order jasmine tea and a chocolate chip cookie the size of Ken’s head. He boggles after it as the barista sets it in the oven to warm, then hurries to move out of the way again as the woman drops her change and turns away from the counter.

His mouth falls open. “Ken,” Noshiko says, sounding surprised and delighted all at once.

He blinks. “I didn’t know you were in New York.”

“I like to watch the tree lighting in Rockefeller,” Noshiko says, nodding a little. “I should’ve called you to let you know I was in town, but…I realized I didn’t have your new number.”

“Oh, yeah, I should give you that.” Ken jams his hand into his pocket before remembering that he keeps his pens in his bag. “Sorry I haven’t written in a while.”

“It’s okay, I know grad school is keeping you busy,” Noshiko says. “I knew you’d get around to it when you had time again.”

There’s a confident ease to her words, as if waiting for months to hear from him again truly didn’t bother her. It sets Ken off-kilter and at ease all at once, like he always feels around her. “Noshiko!” the barista calls, holding up a steaming mug and plate. “Want me to put this at your regular table?”

“Yes, please. Thank you so much, Kyle,” Noshiko says, smiling as the barista carries the food over to the empty table by the window. She turns back to Ken. “Have you been here before?”

“No,” Ken says, still mulling over the barista’s words. _Regular_ table. “I don’t really know how I missed this place before; it’s right near Columbia’s history department.”

“Oh, really?” Noshiko says. She adjusts her knit cap with a shy smile. “Their teas are delicious. I don’t know about their coffee, though. You’d have to tell me.”

“Never could get you around to coffee,” he says, shaking his head with a laugh. A thought suddenly occurs to him. “The tree lighting was weeks ago.”

She shrugs a little, but he catches the faint blush across her cheeks. “I thought I might stick around to watch the ball drop this year. 1990 and all.” She glances up at the menu. “You know, their hot chocolate’s very good here.”

“Really?”

“Mm-hm. Not quite as good as yours, but…” Noshiko smiles. “It comes pretty close.”

“Well, then I’ll definitely have to try it.”

The cash register pings. “I’ll send it over to your table when it’s done,” Kyle says, glancing at Ken before flashing Noshiko a teasing grin. “With extra whipped cream, right, like how you said he always makes it?”

Noshiko glares as Kyle ducks away behind the counter. “Ignore him,” she says, walking to the table with the most elegant huff that Ken has ever seen. “I-”

Kyle reappears between them, setting Ken’s hot chocolate in front of the empty seat and laying a second fork on top of the cookie. “Our cookies are meant for sharing,” he tells Ken seriously, then hurries away from Noshiko’s glare.

Ken sits down slowly, wrapping his hands around the mug and letting the heat warm him up. “So you’re staying in New York for a while?” he asks, aiming for casual and missing completely. His heart can’t stop pounding. “I hear Central Park is beautiful in the springtime.”

“Yeah, I think I might want to stick around for that,” Noshiko says. She bites her lip, then reaches across the table to rest her hand over his. “I missed you, Ken.”

He turns his hand to wind their fingers together. “I’m really glad you’re here, Noshiko,” he says. Noshiko beams, eyes crinkling into bright crescent moons, and Ken squeezes her hand as he takes a sip of hot chocolate. “Wow,” he says, eyebrows lifting, “This really _is_ good.”

Noshiko laughs and brushes whipped cream from the tip of his nose.

 

* * *

 

There is a timeless sort of beauty to Noshiko Yukimura.

It’s unmistakable, Ken thinks, something that he’s always seen, even if he didn’t always know. Something about the way she holds herself, the curve of her smile and the sharpness in her gaze. It’s entrancing and unassuming all at once, curious and familiar, and he’s seen as many people left breathless in her wake as he’s seen pass by without even a fleeting glance. It’s a balance that Ken doesn’t understand, but then again, he isn’t the one who has lived for nearly a millennium.

Sometimes he’s struck by it, when they visit monuments and museums. The Taj Mahal, the Palace of Versailles, structures filled with so much history and so much younger than Noshiko herself. There’s something incredibly humbling about staring at the ceiling of Sistine Chapel and knowing that the woman staring at it next to him lived through its painting. And there’s something even more humbling about watching her gaze at the Venus de Milo, eyes sparkling in awe of a statue who has seen so much more than her long life could even fathom.

Ken is a scholar of history. He understands the chaotic relief of confronting one’s own insignificance.

She reads his collection of history books often. He used to think that she did it to humor him, since he’s never known any of his friends to genuinely enjoy his tedious old tomes – but then again, he’s never known a kitsune from the twelfth century before, either. Noshiko delights in learning about American history – she spent its earlier years in more interesting parts of the world, apparently – and she asks Ken countless questions about states and treaties and policies. Some of them he can answer easily, some of them he needs to dredge up his notes to answer, and some of them he doesn’t know the answer to at all. Noshiko loves those questions the best, and disappears on quests to libraries and ancient book stores until she returns with a satisfactory explanation.

When computers enter the mass market, Noshiko immediately buys one. And then a newer one when a more efficient model is released. And then a newer one. She delights in the advent of the internet, more than anyone else that Ken knows, and she eagerly tracks NASA’s research. Ken starts to understand that curious balance, honoring the past and looking ever forward to the future. He’s looking forward to when he’ll be able to fit more music on his Walkman, for sure. He can only carry so many tapes on his jogs through Central Park.

He watches Noshiko so much, knows her so well and can guess so many of her thoughts, that he doesn’t even notice it at first. He could kick himself for not noticing, not realizing the moment that it began – but that’s the point, isn’t it. There was no definitive beginning to this, there was no turning point in time, and some of life’s greatest questions have no true answer. There is a curious sort of beauty in a tangle of occurrences, a twisting of plans, a wrinkle set in the corner of an eye.

Ken has always looked young for his age – good genetics, he’s always joked. Noshiko has always looked even younger – even better genetics, he’s always joked, and shared a private smile with Noshiko as their friends laughed. But he doesn’t look like he used to as Noshiko’s boyfriend, or as her fiancé, or as her newlywed husband. He’s always been aware of this. What he hasn’t been aware of, apparently, is that Noshiko doesn’t look the same, either.

Nine hundred years is a long time. Nine tails take a lifetime to earn. Nine months can change absolutely everything.

Noshiko tells him about her past loves, sometimes. On quiet nights, sometimes, tucked close to the fireplace while Ken pours steaming hot cocoa into cheery mugs, Noshiko tells him about the people who walked in and out of her lives. Families loved and lost, children grown and gone. It is no small thing, Ken knows, when she presses his hand to her belly for the first time, when her eyes crinkle into a crescent moon smile and lines linger at the corners of her eyes. It is no small thing when Ken holds their daughter in his arms for the first time and he knows, he _knows_.

“Kira,” Noshiko says softly. She strokes Kira’s head gently with one hand, the other gripping Ken’s hand tight as she gazes at their daughter in awe.

He lifts their joined hands and presses a kiss to Noshiko’s fingers, then carefully leans down to kiss the tip of their daughter’s nose. “Kira.”

 

* * *

 

New York had always had such harsh winters. The winds had always felt like frozen gusts, the snow biting and bitter and cracking on Ken’s face. Even at its calmest, even with sun shining through a clear blue sky, he had always felt a chill deep in his bones. Beacon Hills’ winters, by comparison, are downright mild.

Winter is the only mild thing about Beacon Hills, Ken thinks.

He’d thought that he knew the supernatural. His wife was a kitsune, after all, one of the oldest spirits in the world. There were others even older than her, others even more powerful, but young werewolves and even younger hunters? He’d thought that he knew. Not everything, of course, not even half of it, but…he’d thought that he knew enough to be able to help.

He’s never felt as helpless as he does in Beacon Hills. Helpless as the love of his life sacrificed so much of herself to stop an unstoppable evil, helpless as a hunter even younger than him kidnapped his daughter on a quest for vengeance, helpless as his daughter – his sweet daughter, his dear, darling Kira – lost herself in her own power.

And above all, he’s never felt as helpless as he does with Scott McCall. The boy had always had an air about him – a curious mixture of kindness and confidence, fathomless power tempered by restraint so firm that it’s nearly unnoticeable. Ken has long understood what it’s like to see strength drawn from compassion – he’s watched it grow for so long in his daughter. It makes sense, he thinks, that they find themselves drawn to each other time and time again.

If Noshiko hadn’t brought them back to Beacon Hills, if Kira had never met Scott McCall – they might have been spared so much heartbreak, Ken thinks. There is so much that Ken would give anything to erase from Kira’s life. Seventeen is far too young to endure what she did. It’s too young to endure what any of them did.

It isn’t as bad as it used to be. Compared to Kira’s high school days, things are downright peaceful now. Slower. Still, even on sunny days without a whisper of danger carried through the breeze, Ken can’t quite shake the chill deep in his bones.

This year, at least, the chill comes from nothing but the temperature drop that accompanies a snowfall. A Christmas miracle, Scott had called it, eyes bright with glee and looking every inch the gleefully naïve teenager that he never got to be. Sometimes Ken wonders what might have happened if Noshiko had brought them back to Beacon Hills a few months sooner, if Kira had met Scott McCall a few years earlier – but then Ken remembers how helpless he had been then, how little he can help now. Maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference at all. Maybe Ken’s family wouldn’t have been much help to Scott McCall back then.

But when he sees how eagerly Scott listens to him, even about journal articles that have Kira falling asleep before they even get through the abstract; when he sees how quickly Scott jumps up to help him, even just to make hot cocoa in the kitchen…Ken wonders if maybe it doesn’t matter how much he can help Scott with the supernatural world. He wonders if maybe he could still help Scott, still _does_ help Scott, in ways that have nothing to do with werewolves at all.

Ken shakes himself out of his thoughts when spice wafts through the air. He blinks down at the hot cocoa on the stove, then at Scott, who looks utterly stricken with a bundle of cinnamon sticks in his hand. “I’m so sorry,” he says quickly. “I forgot – I wasn’t even thinking, I’m sorry.”

Ken sniffs at the saucepan again. “Sticks are better than the ground stuff, right?” he asks. “It’s been a while since we’ve had proper Mexican hot chocolate. Noshiko says I can never quite get the recipe right, but then again, neither can she.” He flashes Scott a grin. “You’d think eight hundred years would be enough time to learn how to make hot cocoa, but she’s still hopeless with anything that isn’t tea.”

“I heard that,” Noshiko’s voice floats in from the living room, closely accompanied by Melissa’s laughter.

“And you make tea _wonderfully_ , my love,” he calls back. “Truly unparalleled.”

Scott smiles faintly, letting out a relieved breath. “I don’t really know if I make it right,” he admits, stirring the cocoa carefully. “My mom makes it better.”

“Well, tweaking recipes is how we make them better,” Ken says. He sets out more unsweetened cocoa and chili powder, then digs into the back of the cabinet. “Is there anything else you need?”

“Uh, no, this is-” Scott begins, then falls silent when Ken reemerges from the cabinet with a triumphant grin. “You have a…?”

“Can’t really live nine hundred years without becoming a little bit worldly,” Ken says. He holds out the molinillo. “I’m sure you’re much better at this than I am, though.”

“I’m pretty bad at it, too, actually,” Scott admits.

“Oh, no. We’re doomed.”

Scott laughs. He takes the saucepan off the stove, then carefully beats a froth with the molinillo. “There, see?” Ken says. “That looks perfect.”

“Not really,” Scott says, but his cheeks plump in a pleased smile as he pours the hot cocoa into mugs. “I think Kira said she’d be-”

The front door bangs open. “Wow, I forgot how cold snow gets!” Kira says as she steps out of her boots. Ken watches her hurry over to hug Melissa and Noshiko, adjusting her knit cap and looking every bit like her mother, so many years ago. “Is Dad making hot cocoa?”

“Scott, actually,” Ken says as he carries the tray into the living room. “Smells good, right?”

Kira squashes onto the loveseat with Scott and accepts her mug eagerly, eyes sliding closed as she takes a sip. “Oh, wow. Scott, this is _delicious_.”

Scott ducks his head with a bashful grin, then his eyes widen. “Uh, Kira, you’ve got-” He reaches up and brushes froth from the tip of her nose, smiling when Kira’s cheeks redden.

“Oh, jeez,” Kira mumbles, hiding her face behind her mug. “I can’t believe I just – that’s so embarrassing.”

“No, it’s not,” Scott says. He takes a gulp from his own mug, reemerging with froth covering most of his nose and the top of his lip. “There, see? Now we’re even.”

“You’re ridiculous.” Kira bumps their noses together with a fond smile, and Scott beams.

Ken still wishes that he could undo those terrible years, that he could rewrite them and do more to help, do more to protect the children that Kira and Scott and all of their friends had once been. But in quiet moments like these, when Noshiko squeezes his hand tight and the future feels as bright and warm as the hot cocoa in his hands, he knows that they are exactly where they’re meant to be.

 

* * *

 

Forever, Ken thinks, is a mighty long time.

He knows it means something entirely different to Noshiko, something concrete and finite. To her, forever is a closed loop, a beginning and an ending all in one, seamless and contained and so very precious. Forever is a gold band slid onto her finger, a familiar weight with an even heavier absence. There is something affirmative about the way Noshiko says _forever_ , as if she pushed through a lifetime of _maybe_ and _sometimes_ and _if, only if_ lift the word from her tongue. Forever is forever, and Noshiko understands that better than most.

It’s different for Kira. Of course it is, with unfathomable years spread out before her. To her, forever is something intangible, so far beyond her that there’s no use in reaching. She sees forever in the curve of Scott’s smile, in the bright eyes of her children, in their hands tangled together and linked so tight. Forever is now, an unending middle stretching far beyond the horizon, and that is all that she can hope to see. Forever is forever, and Kira may not understand it just yet, but she knows it all the same.

For Ken, forever means…forever. That’s all there is to it. It is indescribable, unconditional, all-encompassing, and he has the luxury of a very finite life. To some, he is long-lived; to others, his lifespan is so very short; to most, his life is average. He likes the acceptance of average, the small victories and quiet delights that mean nothing to the broader world but mean all the more to those he loves most. A ring of hot cocoa spilled from a steaming mug, a crackling fire and snowflakes sprinkled through dark hair, the warm laughter of family and Noshiko’s crescent moon smile. Ken leans close to kiss the tip of her nose and thinks, _this is my forever_.

To him, it is enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say [hi](http://pocketlass.tumblr.com)!


End file.
